An examination and replication of the psychometric properties of the Massachusetts Youth Screening Instrument--second edition (MAYSI-2) among adolescents in detention settings

There is a high prevalence of psychological disorders among adolescents in detention facilities. The need for a simple, effective screening tool led to the development of the Massachusetts Youth Screening Instrument (MAYSI) and its successor, the MAYSI-2. This study evaluated the MAYSI-2 psychometric properties based on the records of 704 youths evaluated at intake to detention facilities. In addition to factor structure, the study evaluated test-retest reliability and concurrent external validity. Results were generally encouraging in terms of the use of MAYSI-2 in detention facilities, and directions for future research are discussed.     

On the delay-dependent involvement of the hippocampus in object recognition memory

The role of the hippocampus in object recognition memory processes is unclear in the current literature. Conflicting results have been found in lesion studies of both primates and rodents. Procedural differences between studies, such as retention interval, may explain these discrepancies. In the present study, acute lidocaine administration was used to temporarily inactivate the hippocampus prior to training in the spontaneous object recognition task. Male C57BL/6J mice were administered bilateral lidocaine (4%, 0.5 microl/side) or aCSF (0.5 microl/side) directly into the CA1 region of the dorsal hippocampus 5 min prior to sample object training, and object recognition memory was tested after a short ( 5 min) or long (24 h) retention interval. There was no effect of intra-hippocampal lidocaine on the time needed for mice to accumulate sample object exploration, suggesting that inactivation of the hippocampus did not affect sample session activity or the motivation to explore objects. Lidocaine-treated mice exhibited impaired object recognition memory, measured as reduced novel object preference, after a 24 h but not a 5 min retention interval. These data support a delay-dependent role for the hippocampus in object recognition memory, an effect consistent with the results of hippocampal lesion studies conducted in rats. However, these data are also consistent with the view that the hippocampus is involved in object recognition memory regardless of retention interval, and that object recognition processes of parahippocampal structures (e.g., perirhinal cortex) are sufficient to support object recognition memory over short retention intervals.     

A longitudinal study of gender-related cognition and behaviour

Gender schema theory proposes that children's acquisition of gender labels and gender stereotypes informs gender-congruent behaviour. Most previous studies have been cross-sectional and do not address the temporal relationship between knowledge and behaviour. We report the results of a longitudinal study of gender knowledge and sex-typed behaviour across three domains in children tested at 24 and 36 months (N = 56). Although both knowledge and sex-typed behaviour increased significantly between 2 and 3 years, there was no systematic pattern of cross-lagged correlations between the two, although some concurrent relationships were present at 24 months. Future longitudinal work might profitably focus on younger children using reliable preverbal measures of gender knowledge and employing a shorter lag between measurement times.     

Collecting responses through Web page drag and drop

This article describes how to collect responses from experimental participants using drag and drop on a Web page. In particular, we describe how drag and drop can be used in a text search task in which participants read a text and then locate and categorize certain elements of the text (e.g., to identify the main claim of a persuasive paragraph). Using this technique, participants respond by clicking on a text segment and dragging it to a screen field or icon. We have successfully used this technique in both the argument element identification experiment that we describe here and a tutoring system that we created to teach students to identify source characteristics while reading historical texts (Britt, Perfetti, Van Dyke, &; Gabrys, 2000). The implementation described here exploits the capability of recent versions of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer Web browser to handle embedded XML documents and drag and drop events.     

Creating activity schedules using Microsoft Powerpoint

We describe how PowerPoint presentation software can be used to create computer activity schedules to teach individuals with special needs. Presented are the steps involved in creating activity schedules with close-ended and open-ended activities, and for preparing schedules that include photos, sounds, text, and videos that can be used to occasion an individual's engagement in a variety of learning activities.     

Recognizing a plane-misoriented view of a familiar object is not influenced by the ease of specifying the main axis of elongation of that object

Participants saw three versions of pictures of familiar objects: the original unaltered (axis-normal) pictures, axis-extended pictures in which the main axes of the axis-normal pictures were elongated, and axis-switched pictures in which objects that were originally horizontally elongated were depicted as vertically elongated and vice versa. Relative to axis-normal pictures, axis extension aided decisions about whether the picture of the object was wide or tall, and axis switching hindered these decisions for both upright and plane-misoriented views. Nevertheless, although these axis manipulations clearly influenced decisions about the location of the object's main axis of elongation, axis-switched pictures were no harder to name than axis-extended pictures. Changing the depicted main axis of elongation by axis switching and axis extension did not influence object recognition in itself, whether for upright or for plane-misoriented views. This suggests that specifying the main axis of elongation of an object does not play an important role in the orientation-sensitive processes involved in identifying plane-misoriented views of that object.     

Difficulties in comprehending causal relations among children with ADHD: the role of cognitive engagement

The present study examined whether time spent in long looks (i.e., >or=15 s), an index of cognitive engagement, would account for differences between children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and comparison children in understanding causal relations. Children viewed two televised stories, once in the presence of toys and once in their absence. Dependent variables were visual attention and questions tapping factual information and causal relations. Comparison children answered significantly more causal relations questions than did the children with ADHD, but only in the toys-present condition. Four lines of evidence revealed that the difficulties children with ADHD had in answering causal relations questions in the toys-present condition could be linked specifically to this group's decreased time spent in long looks.     

Assessment of therapists' and patients' personality: relationship to therapeutic technique and outcome in brief dynamic psychotherapy

My first focus of this study was to explore therapists' personal characteristics as predictors of the proportion of interpretation in brief dynamic psychotherapy (N=39; maximum 40 sessions). In this study, I used data from the Norwegian Multicenter Study on Process and Outcome of Psychotherapy (1995). The main finding was that therapists who had experienced good parental care gave less interpretation (28% variance was accounted for). Therapists who had more negative introjects used a higher proportion of interpretation (16% variance was accounted for). Patients' pretreatment characteristics were not predictive of therapists' use of interpretation. The second focus was to investigate the impact of therapists' personality and the proportion of interpretation on the development of patients' maladaptive defensive functioning over the course of therapy. Better parental care and less negative introjects in therapists were associated with a positive influence and accounted for 5% variance in the reduction of patients' maladaptive defense.     

Illicit drug use and risky sexual behavior among African American and Puerto Rican urban adolescents: the longitudinal links

The authors assessed whether (a) early illicit drug use predicted later risky sexual activity, (b) early risky sex predicted later illicit drug use, and (c) common factors affected both risky sexual behavior and illicit drug use. African American and Puerto Rican youth completed questionnaires in their classrooms at Time 1 (T1) and face-to-face interviews with the authors in their homes 5 years later at Time 2 (T2). Logistic regression analyses showed the association between T1 illicit drug use and T2 risky sexual activity and between T1 risky sexual behavior and T2 illicit drug use. With few exceptions, T1 illicit drug use was associated with all of the T2 risky sexual behaviors. After controlling for demographic factors, the authors found that multiple sex partners at T1 was not related to illicit drug use at T2. Condom use at T1 was related to illicit drug use at T2, whereas sexually transmitted diseases and adolescent pregnancy were not related to this drug use. The findings indicated that assessments of and treatments for substance use should focus on the risky sexual behaviors that seem to accompany illicit drug use.